Ubisoft Lights Up the Big Screen With Three Huge Franchises

May 16, 2011 Written by Max Murray

In today’s materialistic world, who is ever satisfied with what they’ve got? After you instinctively disagree, take a reflective gander at yourself and your current phone, computer, gaming home/portable console, or even your girl/boyfriend and tell me you’re not looking forward to something better. Don’t beat yourself up, we all do it and guess what, so do giant companies! Ubisoft has decided to enact some classic business expansion to spread their boundaries into the movie industry, and what better source material to start off with but using 3 of their biggest franchises?

Ubisoft Motion Pictures, the Paris based motions picture division of Ubisoft launched in early January, has released plans set forth to expand the Assassin’s Creed, Splinter Cell, and Ghost Recon series into Hollywood’s territory with big screen, 3D counterparts.

The studio is headed by former EuropaCorp CEO Jean-Julien Baronnet who says efforts are being taken to collaborate with the producers and Ubisoft’s marketing team to ensure consistency is held through the series with the expansions. Jean de Rivieres, the senior VP of international marketing and distribution, ensures the action is to provide greater depth for the fans.

Our strategy is not to diversify but to bolster the appeal of our franchises — that’s why we want to make sure our films will reflect the brands accurately and consolidate our fan base while expanding beyond the games’ primary target audience.

According to Baronnet, the group’s projects have drawn great interest from U.S. studios and screenwriters. An initial trip to Los Angeles will take place next month to meet with studios and agents for the future projects. Ubisoft Motion Pictures will utilize the resources of the game publisher and have their 23 studios with which to draw resources from, including Ubisoft Digital Arts and Hybride Technologies. Baronnet explained:

We want to keep ownership, retain control over the film content, and we’re open to work with studios on the development of our projects, and eventually collaborate on the pre-casting, pre-budget and script.

With the ball rolling, Rivieres is confident to have their first script in hand by the end of the year, although it wasn’t mentioned which of the three franchises will get the initial focus. Ubisoft Motion Pictures is also developing Raving Rabbids, a jokey CGI 3D cartoon series based on the popular franchise that will comprise of 78 episodes of seven minutes.

Have you been scarred by poor video-game ports enough times to ignore this news, or can you see yourself being swept away by your favorite characters brought to life on screen?